Battered and Bewildered
by redhead evans
Summary: After years with an abusive husband, Hermione finally gathers the courage to seize her chance and escape to the only safe place left to her anymore: Hogwarts. Abusive!Ron. MM/Hr.
1. Chapter 1

**AN:** I am sure those of you who have read (and followed) some of my other stories at this point are wondering why on earth I'm starting yet *another* story that has absolutely nothing to do with my others. So am I. But sometimes I find it easier to switch venues from time to time when I get stuck, and let's face it, I get seriously stuck with the Vampire Prince fairly often (sorry about that!). Anyway, I am working on it, promise, but for now, here's something new to possibly catch your attention while I attempt to make something happen with a different plot. As always, thanks for reading!

* * *

><p>Hermione nervously watched the clock in the living room tick from one second to the next from her seat at the kitchen table. Dinner was awaiting only a few final touches, one of them being her husband's presence, but the meal that was sitting on the stove was possibly the farthest thing from her mind at that moment. A magazine was propped up in her lap; to the casual observer it would seem as if she was simply flipping through catalogues and magazines to pass the time until she could greet her husband at the door and remove dinner from the oven. Her legs were crossed at the knee, right over left, her right foot bouncing a slow, casual rhythm. For all intents and purposes she was relaxed and calm, and engrossed in her magazine.<p>

In actuality, Hermione hadn't turned the page in at least five minutes, her eyes hadn't left the clock in at least seven, and, as usual, she was anything but calm and relaxed. The source of her anxiety wasn't due home for another five minutes (in the best (or worst) case scenario) but the fact that she had time to spare before Ron got home didn't seem to have much of an impact on her anxiety levels, nor on what she did with her free time.

Ron and Hermione had been married for four years (one short year and three long ones, if you asked Hermione, not that she ever would have said it out loud) and dated for two once the war with Voldemort was over. Even after six years, and a previous seven of friendship in their school days, Hermione was still surprised to find herself in the sort of situation that she found herself in. She hated her marriage, and she hated her husband. Worse than the hate, she was afraid of her husband, and for good reason. Sometimes she had no reason to worry, no reason to be afraid, but sometimes she did have reason. It was those sometimes that she did have reason that made her always worried and afraid.

Each morning Ron went to work and Hermione breathed a small sigh of relief, and then started her own work. What she did with her day while Ron was gone was nothing like the life she had wanted to be leading at this point in her life, and it wasn't even similar to the life she had led during her and Ron's year of newly wed bliss. Hermione had gone straight from the end of the war into a job at the Ministry of Magic, but she had given up her desk job at the end of their one short year of marriage. People occasionally asked Ron if he minded that Hermione had given up her career to play housewife, leaving him to be the only responsible adult in the household; Ron always told them that the responsibility was tough but that he supported his wife in everything she decided to do. Ron was the reason Hermione had quit in the first place.

Working for the Ministry and keeping house weren't too terribly different once you figured out the ropes (or so Hermione told herself). Keeping things clean to Ron's pristine standards wasn't too different from keeping her desk tidy and organized (the difference being that she would have never used a drop of bleach to clean her desk, let alone the massive amounts that it took to keep the house spotless) and she still got to enjoy the relaxation of allowing her mind to drift as she lost herself in the menial work (though filing and filling out paperwork was much more relaxing than scrubbing the kitchen floor). She watched T.V. sometimes when Ron was gone too, but only daytime programs and what was shown as re-runs.

Ron didn't approve of T.V., at least not when she was sitting in front of it, thinking it as entirely too muggle for a Wizarding home, which is why she chose to stick to catalogs, magazines, and books after dinner was ready and before Ron got home. Heaven forbid Ron come home and find her on the couch with the remote in her hand. Sometimes, even a book was risky; Ron no longer wanted the bookworm that she had been in school. Ron liked his wife to be productive, well read (which she was by the time she had graduated Hogwarts) but not political, and without a real opinion about most things. Ron didn't care if she had an opinion about last fall's jacket styles in comparison to those of this fall, or if she was totally riveted by the garbage that Rita Skeeter chose to call journalism; he did cared if she supported a woman running for Minister of Magic (such thoughts were un-lady-like, and only for butch lesbian feminists without a good man in their lives. Clearly (according to Ron), Hermione was none of the above, so why worry her pretty little head?). Besides, Ron was opinionated enough for the both of them.

Ron liked his house, and his wife, looking like a perfect postcard from the 1950's, with the surfaces spotless and shining like they belonged in an infomercial, and he wanted a woman like his mother, who cared for nothing outside her own kitchen. Just the thought of Ron's standards for cleanliness made her eyes slide away from the clock for the first time in nine minutes, in favor of the kitchen counters, but she stopped herself before her eyes could get there. Better that her eyes were glued to the clock then for her to catch sight of the kitchen counters. Invariably there would be something that needed cleaning before Ron got home, and as her luck would have it, Ron would walk in to find her cleaning. That prompted one of two responses: either Ron got angry that his wife was always working and working like a house-elf, and called her a perfectionist, or Ron got sad and demanded to know if she thought that he was the type of husband who made his wife do nothing but clean. Usually the second option ended up turning into the first. Neither were fun if you were Hermione.

Ron liked keeping up appearances. The two of them occasionally went to parties where Hermione was so close to the life she had lived before that she could practically taste it, where Hermione was allowed to have an opinion about things, was allowed to argue with friends, and where she was able to break nearly every rule that she lived her day to day life by. Ron's rules. Every once in a while he had to sit there and let her do whatever she wanted, as long as no one seemed offended by her behavior. No one ever did.

As usual, the only warning that she got was the loud crack that accompanied apparation as Ron appeared in the foyer. The magazine was easily tossed towards the middle of the table and after a quick look at one of the gently bubbling pots on the stove she turned and hurried into the front room where her husband would be waiting for her.

"What's for dinner?" he asked rudely as soon as she came into view from around the corner.

"Ronald!" she admonished. "Don't be rude," she added, reaching up to pull him into a kiss.

He took a step back to avoid her grasp and narrowed his eyes at her. "What was that?" he asked slowly, ears turning red with anger.

"I said 'don't be rude'," she supplied for him, heart racing as his entire face flushed. It seemed that he was in one of those moods today.

"What on earth would have given you the impression that I was rude?" he asked with a dangerous rumble in his tone.

Temper flaring, a sure sign that she was frazzled, she crossed her arms across her chest and leveled a glare of her own at him. "Usually people greet their spouses happily when they come home from work, Ronald. Civilized people don't put dinner before their wives."

An instant later she was on the ground, holding a hand to her cheek. She could almost see the red handprint that would be there. From experience she knew to stay down, knowing that soon he would have left the room for their bedroom to loosen his tie and discard his robes for the evening. It was only then, when she was sure that he was out of the room, that she allowed herself to stand and make her way to the kitchen, hand still on her stinging cheek.

Idly, she wondered how it was possible that she had never grown used to being struck across the face. It certainly happened often enough that she should have been by now, if such a thing were possible, but it appeared as if she was going to have to feel the full brunt of every slap that Ron gave her with no sign of dulling the pain. It was this thought, oddly enough, wondered for the first time in three long years, that truly alerted her to the danger that she was in at the moment. Not from Ron, necessarily, because he was still in the bedroom changing out of his work robes, but from the terrible lifestyle that she lived because she was with him. She'd had standards, and brains, and enough foolhardy Gryffingdor courage to know that she, by all accounts, really _shouldn't_ have even found herself in a position like this. Especially not a position like this that had been the only constant in her life for the past three years. Where were the standards for her life and happiness that she had set for herself back before things got bad? She had a feeling the answer was that they had been slapped, punched, and kicked right out of her, bit by bit, every time Ron had laid a hand on her until there was no longer anything left to be beaten out. Not that it stopped him. She was a broken animal now, she realized with disdain.

Part of her, the beaten and broken part, screamed at her to stop her thoughts in their tracks, because surely such traitorous thoughts would lead to trouble, and were punishable by more of the very behavior that they were so open in their disdain for. The other part, however, was the loudest, and it was also the most dangerous. It was that part of her that remembered how she and Harry and Ron had come to even be friends, the day when Ron had insulted her so terribly she had cried through dinner in one of the girls restrooms until they had to save her from a troll on the loose. Years later, they had looked back at the incident as a bonding experience, another adventure amongst their many others, but the part of her that was yelling loud enough to drown out the caution born of many hard-learned lessons was reminding her that if it weren't for Ronald Bloody Weasley she wouldn't have even been in the bloody bathroom in the first place. His callousness had nearly gotten her killed, and just because Harry had been enough of a gentleman to realize his friend's mistake didn't mean that she should have rewarded the idiot for his bravery as if he hadn't owed it to her to make the effort in the first place. If it were up to Ron Weasley, that part of her brain said, the young version or the older one, she would be dead by now. Perhaps it was that trait that he was trying to beat out of her, and not just her spirit. Perhaps that was why they continued when her spirit had long ago fled.

It was back now, though, she knew, and tattered and battered and bloody and bruised as it was, it wasn't going to just slink away and hide this time. It called for action. It called for her to suck up her pride and admit to others that she was in trouble and needed help, and to have the bravery to show them that they had been blind and easily led when they had probably seen the signs and allowed themselves to think the safer option, rather than the true one. And it called for her to summon her courage to move forward with her life, leaving everything behind her, and start over totally new, where Ron couldn't touch her. Whether that meant fleeing the country and living under a false name, or simply outing him to all of their friends and fleeing to them for their aid in protecting herself from further harm, she couldn't be sure right that instant, but she could be sure that either way, it was now inevitable. Ron had never truly been able to stand a chance against her when she put her mind to something, and in this case, there was nothing she had ever been more determined to succeed in. Even Ronald Bloody Weasley couldn't hope to compete with that.

It was more luck than any real skill or manipulation on her part that saved her from any more abuse that night once Ron came back into the kitchen. Hermione's mind was too focused on the very beginnings of the plan that had just come to life in the back of her mind, and her distraction allowed her the ability to hear Ron's comments without experiencing the reaction that she would have normally had to quell and Ron was too occupied with himself to notice that his usually fiery wife, though she tried hard to hide it, was more subdued than usual. Her thoughts lingered on the tantalizing idea of her impending freedom (or escape attempt, as she forced herself to refer to it, knowing that nothing was certain, and it _was_ possible that all of her efforts would come to naught) for the duration of dinner, all through the time she spent in the evening cleaning the kitchen and doing the washing up, and the time that it took for them to get ready for bed. The lights snapped off at Ron's barked command, wand twirling in his long fingers before disappearing under his pillow, and soon her husband's raucous snores filled the bedroom. It mattered not to Hermione, though she would have been somewhat irritated on any other night, but Hermione had laid down with no real intention of going to sleep that night, her brain was working too furiously for that. Instead she waited to make sure that her husband was fully asleep, knowing that once Ron was asleep he was, for the most part, dead to the world, and then wriggled her way out from under his arm, draped oppressively and possessively across her waist, and headed for the kitchen.

The area was so clean that it sparkled brightly when she flipped the light switch, blinding her for the moment that it took for her eyes to adjust to the sudden influx of light. Whereas Ron used the common household spells for normal actions like turning on a light, Hermione was forced to do everything the muggle way. She had cursed him many times for it, but it was an easy enough adjustment thanks to her upbringing. Truth be told, even if she still had possession of her wand, it was likely that she would have still used the switches, since they _were_ there, instead of using her wand. She had, after all, managed without magic for nearly twelve full years of her life, and turning on a light the muggle way wouldn't kill her. However, the habitual motion brought with it a tide of questions and problems that were unusual, and as she moved towards the kettle to set some water to boil, she allowed her mind the ability that she hadn't been able to grant it that entire evening and let her thoughts dwell freely and without reservation on planning.

The most obvious issue was that she was wandless. It would be possible enough for her to escape using muggle means, after all Ron had given her free run to go shopping in town when she needed to and had never seemed to fear that she would simply step onto a bus and disappear. Despite his lack of concern, she still considered it, briefly, no less than five times a year, each time arriving at the same conclusion that he had. Ron, as an Auror, had more than enough resources available to him to track her down, even if she kept strictly to muggle places and did only muggle things, and she had never dared make the attempt anyway because she knew that if she was caught, which she was almost certain that she would be, there would be hell to pay for her actions when he finally dragged her back home. With a wand, it was possible for her to defend herself and keep from being captured, but without one, she was next to useless when it came to defending herself. Very few muggle methods were useful against magic (which was why Voldemort had found them all too easy targets), and Hermione, though fully reared in a muggle environment, had been so immersed in the magical world that she had never bothered with finding an alternate means of protecting herself. The introduction of magic into her life had come at a crucial, and crippling, time in her life; she had just been at the age when needing to be able to defend herself to some extent was important, and magic had easily provided the means she had sought. It had never truly crossed her mind that without her wand she was helpless.

With muggle means thus eliminated, that left only magical ones at her disposal. Wandless, however, she wouldn't have been able to get near any potions or charmed objects that would be useful; Ron had made the excuse that they both wanted to live in a quiet little muggle town, out of the hustle and bustle of both worlds so that they could live as much of a relaxing life as possible, and have a large muggle presence in their home so that Hermione could stay true to her heritage, but the only thing such an action had done was make it nearly impossible for her to get anywhere magical before Ron noticed that she was missing. Ron had also taken plenty of precautions with making sure that she couldn't access her wand, despite how much freedom she was given during the hours that he was away at work. She knew exactly where it was kept; he had hardly made an effort to hide the location from her, but he had charmed it specifically so that it would take his wand, or some fancy, complicated and strenuous spellwork to make the case open And without a wand, that meant that the second option was closed to her, while the first was nearly impossible. Ron, whether from fear that she would make an effort to take his wand from him or from habit learned in his training, never let his wand out of his sight, and never left her with an opportunity to get anywhere near it. Even now, dead asleep, it might as well have been locked in a vault at Gringotts, since there was no way for her to get under his pillow without waking him unless she used a levitation spell. And if she'd had the ability to levitate him off his pillow, she wouldn't have been needing his wand anyway.

Sighing at the large tangle she found herself in, she forced her thoughts once more to her surroundings, realizing with some shock that she had retrieved both cup and saucer from the cupboard and had just finished stirring in both sugar and cream into the tea that she had been making. The cup barely rattled on the saucer at all as she pushed herself away from the counter and moved across the room to sit at her usual spot at the kitchen table, her mind losing it's focus on reality the instant she sat down.

There was no way for her to get her hands on another wand, nor on Ron's, without some sort of help. Thinking about it, she wondered what things she _did_ have at her disposal that could be useful. Guns, knives, or a weapon of any kind were totally out of the question; she didn't know how to use them properly, and it was entirely possible that she would end up hurting herself more than she was hurting him. Either that, or she would end up doing something more drastic than intended due to her inexperience. She had some, limited, access to herbs and potions ingredients thanks to the contents of Molly Weasley's garden, but it likely wasn't going to be enough to make anything incredibly useful. They did, with some regularity, go to the Burrow for family gatherings and there, like at Ministry galas and other events, Ron was forced to relax his watch on her somewhat. She was allowed her wand, knowing that if she ran he would notice, and was allowed somewhat free run of the house and yard, though the high number of people gathered there made it nearly impossible for her to be alone, or unwatched, at any given time. It wasn't likely, even if Molly's garden had anything useful in it, that she would be able to get to it without someone noticing anything. Once again, the evidence pointed her, logically, towards muggle means.

What she wanted, of course, was a stunning spell, or a dreamless sleep potion: something that would knock Ron out for long enough that she could be long gone by the time he figured it out, and something that would incapacitate him without having to worry that he would suddenly free himself and ruin everything. Outside of using a taser on him, she knew muggles didn't have anything that would drop him unconscious in an instant. The best she would be able to do then, was something that would ensure that once he was out, that he would stay out, and unfortunately she'd have to deal with the stress and possible variances and deviations from the plan that such imperfections would cause. Muggles hadn't invented anything as foolproof as a dreamless sleep draught, but they had invented sleeping pills, and if she could get Ron to take enough to put a baby elephant to sleep (and not kill him in the process) she thought that the effect would be, essentially, the same. If she was lucky, he'd pass out so that his wand wasn't so squarely underneath him, so she wouldn't even have to move him out of the way.

The method decided on, she moved past that to formulating the plan that would actually take her from the house, and her husband, for good, and with her wand. It would be an easy enough thing to slip the pills, finely crushed, into his food, and easy enough to avoid eating whatever she put it in. Ron hadn't ever outgrown his teenaged eating habits and so still ate like a human vacuum cleaner, which meant that they quite often didn't eat quite the same meal, and he wouldn't notice the absence of something on her plate so long as it didn't look any less full than usual, or so she hoped. And once the pills took effect, all she would have to do would be to get his wand, use it to stupefy him, just in case, and then charm her way through the wards that held her own wand captive. Packing, if she did some amount of preparation beforehand, would be easy enough to do quickly the muggle way, but she was also able to pack her things magically, in case she was worried about it. Once that was handled, really, there wasn't anything else to keep her in the house, and she would be free to leave to... wherever it was that she ended up going to.

Over the years she had given some thought to where she would go if she had ever managed to escape, but her musings on the topic had left her as inconclusive an answer as her previous musings on her escape method. The truth was, anyone she would have considered as someone that she could go to for help had probably already been around her for long enough that they should have recognized the signs already, and hadn't. With that being the case, how likely were they to believe her word for it when they hadn't seen anything (or if they had, they'd ignored anything) that proved otherwise? Harry and Ginny were happily married, and were around her and Ron as much as anyone, and had known them for the longest. Truth be told, it still stung a bit that Harry, her first magical friend, hadn't even noticed anything out of the ordinary when she suddenly revamped her entire life and gave up all her previous ambitions. The same could go for Ginny, who had been her closest girl friend throughout her Hogwarts years. None of her other friends, those from Gryffindor or those from without, were close enough that she felt able to drag them into the situation. Worse, she wasn't sure that they knew her well enough to know how serious the issue was, and act accordingly. She could see herself going to someone, Neville perhaps, and having them try to insist on some sort of mediation. Mediation was past being something that would actually work with their relationship. Another option was any one of the Weasley brothers, or even Molly and Arthur themselves, but she didn't want to involve the family and divide them any more than necessary. She doubted that if confronted with the issue that Molly would accept it fully, and Arthur would be hobbled in his ability to do anything by his wife's actions. The twins, she had no doubt, would gladly pummel Ron to a pulp if she asked, but she didn't want to think what that would do to the family. There would be no neutral sides chosen if that happened, and while she didn't think that Ron deserved the high regard he held with his family given his actions, she didn't want to destroy both him and the family by pointing that out.

In a fit of something, slight hysteria probably, she realized exactly how many of her thoughts began with "what she needed" or "what she wanted". At that particular moment of realization, she wanted nothing more than the Room of Requirement so that she wouldn't have to torture herself by going over the same facts and figures that she'd been through countless times already in the years previous. There was, she knew, a reason she had yet to even attempt escape. Not only could the room, if it had been a tool that was available for her to work with, provide her with a place to be safe from Ron, but no doubt she could have gotten it to give her a better way to knock him out of the picture than muggle sleep aids. Sadly, the Room of Requirement would do her no good, securely locked within the Highland fortress that was Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, so far beyond her magical and muggle reach that it was almost of more harm than help to be thinking of it. There was no use in dwelling on all of the opportunities and possibilities that were no longer in her grasp, that she had watched slip through her fingers.

It was this thinking of the room, though, that made her realize that there was only one place in the world she could be safe. Ron's power was widespread enough, working for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, that he would be able to track her even if she left the country. A carefully worded tale about a missing wife, kidnapped perhaps, and it was entirely possible that the D.M.L.E. would be able to get some intelligence passed to them from other countries and before long she'd be "rescued" and back at square one. Nowhere, save for one place, was outside of the Ministry's sphere of influence, if they correct story was told, she realized. That one place was all the more perfect a hiding place because of how well it appeared to be within her husband's reach, and within the reach of the Ministry, but they didn't call Hogwarts one of the safest places in the world for nothing. Dumbledore, and countless Headmasters and Headmistresses before him, had very carefully set Hogwarts apart from the Ministry. It was, geographically, within their territory. They had appointed a Board of Governors to oversee the curriculum, leadership, and funding of the fabled institution, and in doing so exert some control over the way it was run, but Hogwarts and the Ministry were constantly finding themselves at odds, and Hogwarts, always to the Ministry's surprise and dismay, was able to stand alone far better than the Ministry could have predicted. Hogwarts had never needed the Ministry, per say, but chose to, for the most part, maintain the illusion that they were in alliance.

Dumbledore, of course, was no longer Headmaster, and hadn't been since their sixth year at Hogwarts, but Hermione knew his successor better than most, or so she thought. Regardless of how true that statement was, though, she was absolutely certain that she knew Minerva McGonagall much better than Ron Weasley could even hope to claim. The older woman had been her mentor all throughout her Hogwarts years, and as she grew older their extra-curricular discussions had started revolving less and less around the more obscure and complicated aspects of the professor's chosen discipline and had turned more and more towards the topics that were generally covered with a friend. She doubted that Ron had really seen anything of their former Head of House aside from her love of quidditch, and her penchant for rewarding his stupidity with the occasional detention. However, Hermione knew better. She knew, as most of Hogwarts did, that the woman was imposing, regal, calm, confident, strict, though fair, and a master at her craft. She also knew the woman rarely smiled, but that even the tiniest smile of hers could convey a multitude of meanings all at once. She knew that Minerva was always willing to lend a helping hand to one of her students if they asked for it, and even sometimes when they did not, and that she, for all her strictness, was a gentle and patient teacher. She knew of the woman's fondness for chess and ginger newts, her fierce love for those students placed in her care, not necessarily only those in Gryffindor, and her inability to maintain a strictly professional outlook when faced with a quidditch match in which Gryffindor was playing. She knew that Minerva, like Dumbledore, stood up for what was right, and protected those in harm's way to the best of her abilities. Most importantly, however, Hermione knew, with unnerving certainty, that if she showed up at the castle gates, no matter if school was in session or not, Minerva would welcome her in with a warm smile, a cup of tea, some ginger newts, and would do everything in her power to protect Hermione from her troubles.

It was to Hogwarts, then, that she had to go. The thought came as a surprising relief, one that she didn't think came solely from having the entire plan hammered out and being (mostly) satisfied that it would work. Perhaps, more than she had realized, Hogwarts had always been home for her. It would make her escape even better now that she would be ending up there.

Plan as solid as it was going to get, her mind finally at peace for the first time since Ron had walked through that door earlier, Hermione finished the last of her tea and took both cup and saucer to the sink, placing them with a soft clink on the counter before heading to bed. Soon, cleaning the kitchen to an immaculate cleanliness level wasn't going to be her problem; she might as well get used to it now.

* * *

><p><strong><span>AN:<span>** As always with my stories, I have no idea when I will be updating, but let's hope for soon! This will be, in case you didn't catch it, a multi-chapter fic.


	2. Chapter 2

**AN:** And here is the (eagerly anticipated I'm sure) second installment of Battered and Bewildered. Enjoy!

* * *

><p>It took the better part of the week for Hermione to get her hands on the sleeping pills, though not because they were particularly difficult to obtain. She had gone to bed late that night feeling emboldened and confident, but she had inexplicably woken up paralyzed by doubt, uncertainty, and fear. Had she been up to it, she could have gone to the store that same day and purchased what she needed but there was more preparation involved than planning and obtaining materials, and mentally, it took her the rest of the week to get her act together.<p>

When she had first hatched this plan, and decided that she was going to go her own way for once, she hadn't realized how seriously life changing this undertaking was to be. Once she did this, any of this, there could and would be no going back. Ron would flay her alive, for starters, but there was even more to it than that. People always talked about life-changing choices and decisions, and usually they were referring to new jobs, or moving to a new house, or graduating. She was about to do pretty much every life changing thing in the book, all at once. She'd need a divorce (and no one could call that something with little impact on someone's life), a new place to live, a job. She'd have to re-evaluate her friend circle and decide who and where it was safest for her to be. She'd have to press charges if Ron tried anything funny. The entire thing, regardless of the complexities of the actual plan itself, had the potential to turn into one gigantic catastrophe. There wasn't a strong enough word in the English language, she didn't think, to describe what this could become if at any point she fucked it up.

Surprisingly, overcoming those thoughts and doubts was much more difficult than any of the preparation. The pills were purchased with ease and she didn't hesitate once while she crushed them and swept the resulting dust into a dish she knew to be a favorite of Ron's that she wouldn't be going anywhere near that night. Her closet had been organized so that packing would be simply a matter of taking things from point A and moving them to point B, and with magic this would be made even easier, and she had double and triple checked to make sure that her wand hadn't been moved. She had been unable to use it for so long that she had, for the most part, learned to stop reaching for it in the mornings, and had stopped herself from longing for it constantly. Dwelling on what couldn't be helped, she'd told herself, would do her no good, and it had been better to just leave it as one of the few things that she didn't spare much thought towards.

For the first time in their marriage, the compliance and smile she showed to Ron wasn't at all fake. After all, how could she begrudge him when she was about to knock him on his ass and leave him seriously unhappy for the future? Her compliance, real or fake, never had been enough to ensure that his fists didn't fly in her direction but she counted herself lucky when all she received was a split lip. That, in this house, was as fortunate as fortunate could be, so, choosing to see it as a good omen, she moved forward with as much confidence as she could muster. She watched carefully as Ron heaped seconds and then thirds onto his plate, masking her interested glances as best she could and counting on the fact that Ron was too busy eating to be paying attention to anything less interesting than an all out explosion. As she cleared and cleaned the dishes, her body grew more tense until she was standing at the sink, watching the water run more than doing the dishes, like a coiled spring. She had guessed at dosages, naturally, since "enough to take out a baby elephant" wasn't a listed dosage, and so she wasn't exactly sure how much he had ingested, or how fast it would work. It was possible, she decided, that he would drop that very instant.

He didn't. He did come fairly close to doing so, however, stumbling towards the bed not long after she had finished the dishes to remove his shoes from a sitting position due to his sudden and extreme drowsiness. Moments later he was fast asleep, sprawled across their bed, snoring loud enough to wake the dead. She herself was shocked at the sudden effect, or at his good acting skills in regards to hiding his exhaustion; she had wandered into the en-suite bathroom while he was awake and when she had emerged moments later he was fast asleep, looking, for all appearances, as if he'd been out for hours. Cursing and frantic, she rushed over to him. She had been hoping, against hope apparently, that he would fall asleep so that it was easy to get to his wand but at the moment she not only knew where it was but had a sneaking suspicion that it was exactly where she didn't want it to be. A quick glance at him showed that it wasn't visibly on his person, but that didn't rule out the possibility that it was on the bed still, but to be safer she still checked the pockets of everything he'd worn that day, as well as the surrounding area to make sure that it wasn't there.

It wasn't. She took a deep breath to center herself and let her thoughts go. She had to get to that wand, and it was underneath him. She wasn't sure that she could flip him over, and if she did, she wasn't sure it would be without waking him up. But the sleeping pills should have only reinforced how soundly he slept, shouldn't it? With only one way to find out, Hermione grabbed a hold of the arm farthest from her and pulled, rolling Ron towards her and onto his side. She stopped pulling before he rolled right onto her lap, knowing it would do her no good to then get trapped under his dead weight, and carefully stood so that she could investigate the area that he had just vacated. He was still partially on the wand, but didn't appear to be anywhere near waking up, so he simply pulled it out from under him and stepped away from the bed.

Grinning widely at the familiar sensation of having a wand in her hand, she swished it through the air and watched the sparks fly from it's tip. Behind her, Ron flopped back into his original position on the bed, but she was too entranced by the taste of freedom to even notice. Ron's wand had never been the most suitable match for her, but despite the slightly jarring feeling of having an incompatible wand in her hand, she couldn't help but be happy. So happy, in fact that she spun around quickly and shot three spells at her still sleeping husband.

"_Stupefy. Petrificus Totalus. Incarcerous_," she said in quick succession, wand moving with an easy precision. It seemed that there were many things that were like riding a bike, and luckily for her spellwork was one of them. She nodded in satisfaction as she took in the image of her husband, body frozen stiff as a board and wrapped from head to toe in thick ropes. The stunning spell would wear off soon, of course, but the body bind wasn't likely to dissipate before the sleeping pills had worked their way out of his system and the ropes were there to stay. She would be nice and leave his wand in the kitchen for him to find, but by the time he woke up she would be long gone, and by the time he was able to move, even within the confines of the ropes that bound him, she would be even more securely out of his reach. It would take him forever to get help, and just as long to get to his wand, which she wasn't even sure he would be able to use given how tightly his arms were tied at his sides. Smirking, she summoned the box that held her own wand and moved with it towards the dresser.

Hermione's strength had always been in charms but she couldn't help feel some small sense of apprehension as she stared at the box, Ron's wand at the ready. She knew, of course, what spells were on the box, but she also knew that Ron had taken extra care with them to ensure that she would have a difficult time with them. She had a wand already, and briefly she considered just taking Ron's wand with her. Without any wand in the house but hers, and that one locked away, Ron would have an even more difficult time getting free and being able to track her down, but the thought of having to spend the entire rest of her days with Ron's wand, as stubborn and resistant as it was to her directions, made her cringe and start casting the counter spells. Six wand movements and incantations later, she tried the lid of the box. It didn't budge.

"_Alohamora_," she said with the very last of her calm. She hadn't thought there would be anything more than those six spells to keep her out of the box, and she wasn't sure that she would be able to figure out the remaining spells and their counters if her guess wasn't correct. Hardly daring to breathe, she tried the lid again. This time it opened. Hand trembling, she reached in and closed her fingers around the vinewood wand. Unlike Ron's wand, hers shot sparks the instant her fingers were fully wrapped around the handle, and the contrast between the two wands in her hand was so amazing that she nearly dropped them both. Her grin was permanently etched onto her face.

One summoning spell later and her trunk was sitting on the floor in front of her and she easily set her belongings to packing themselves as she busied herself with levitating her husband farther onto the bed and changing into clothes that would be suitable for Hogwarts. Dinner was likely still going at the moment; Ron came home from work promptly at five o'clock and it was only now fully dark outside. Dinner at Hogwarts started later, and ran for much longer in order to give students the time to unwind from classes and eat dinner at whatever time they preferred. If she was going to cause a stir walking into the Great Hall, she might as well look good doing so.

Unable to help it, she left her now-packed trunk standing open in the middle of the bedroom and walked back into the master bathroom to stare at herself in the mirror. She wore very little makeup, and what little she did wear didn't need any touching up, but even with the makeup there her split lip and the bruises on her cheekbone and jawbone were visible. Not obvious, per say, because she didn't look like a piece of tenderized meat at that particular moment, but she did look like she'd, at the very least, been in some sort of physical altercation. Her robes bid the bruises on her arms and hips. She had only one thing left to do before she could leave the place for good, but no matter how eager she was to be gone she found herself practically rooted in front of the bathroom counter as her mind warred over the idea of casting some sort of cosmetic charm to cover up the evidence of her husband's abuse. She would, after all, be walking into a hall full of schoolchildren, and she had her pride. Was hiding the truth, and making it seem as if nothing had happened more soothing to her ego, which was just as bruised as the rest of her was, or was walking in, head held high and clearly a survivor, the better choice?

In the end, several agonizing minutes later, she decided to leave them visible. They weren't glaring, certainly, but people who saw her up close would notice them, and it was that visibility that stayed her wand. After all, Ron would eventually find her and come to bring her back, pretending as if he was the wronged party. At least there would be people around her when that happened who had seen the evidence of what he had done to her. She exited the bathroom, closing the lid of her trunk and shrinking it with a charm before summoning it and placing it safely in her pocket. After years of doing things the muggle way, she found herself feeling like a first year: absolutely giddy at the idea that all of her worldly possessions were taking up no more space than that of a matchbox in her pocket. Both wands went into one hand, the other snagged the wand box off of the dresser as she left the room. Briefly she thought about hitting the light switch with her elbow on the way out, but decided to leave it on. She didn't feel like taking the effort to turn it off, and it wasn't her electricity bill anymore.

The wand box went on the kitchen table and Ron's wand was placed carefully inside it. The table was always kept clear of all but a few things, and if Ron ever made it out this far he would be able to find it easily. Very carefully she replaced all of the spells he had placed on the box when it had held her wand, and not his, beginning with a _colloportus_ and not stopping until she felt the very last ward settle firmly into place. Her engagement ring and wedding band were carefully place on top of the box before she turned to take one last look at the prison she had called a home for far too many years. It still bore some traces of her having lived there, not evident simply in the feminine touches that showed in the decorations but also in pictures and small trinkets and possessions that were scattered around the room. None of those things held any significance to her. With a satisfied nod she spun on her heel and disapparated with a soft pop.

Fall was in full swing at Hogwarts and the first thing she noticed when she re-appeared in front of the Main Gates was that the nights were much brisker this time of year this far north than they were in the English town she had come from. Despite the cold, however, she found herself relaxing as she looked across the grounds towards the familiar castle, with all of it's towers and turrets, and the twinkling lights that to her had never truly stopped being home. It was good to be back at Hogwarts.

The gates swung open at her touch, perhaps sensing that she wasn't there to harm anyone, and she walked through them briskly, hoping to warm up slightly and get the long walk to the castle itself over with relatively quickly. Despite being inside the wards, some part of her wanted to get inside as quickly as possible. The faster she was inside the faster she could explain her situation to Minerva. There was, of course, the smallest opportunity that she would be turned away, and if that happened it was better for her that she not be out in the open for too long, in case Ron exceeded expectations for once in his life and managed to weasel his way free. The closer she got to the castle, the more her doubts grew, and by the time she pushed her way through the well oiled oak doors into the Entrance Hall she was as nervous about proceeding into the Great Hall as she had been to touch Ron earlier that evening for fear of waking him up. Arguing internally with herself, she stared at the doors for a while before squaring her shoulders and raising her chin. She had come too far to back out now.

The doors flew open to admit her as she stepped forward and Hermione found herself glad that she had steeled herself before trying to enter as hundreds of eyes focused on her and conversations cut off abruptly. In the silence that followed, her footsteps, somehow steady and measured, echoed loudly off the walls. As she continued walking whispers sprung up, and by the time she reached the head of the House tables there was muted conversation, of which she had no doubt she was the topic, all around the Hall. As she approached the Head Table, Minerva McGonagall rose to greet her, wand in hand.

Hermione swallowed hard before speaking, striving to keep her voice even. "My deepest apologies for interrupting dinner, Headmistress," she said, eyes darting to either side of the regal woman to fix on the many familiar faces that lined the staff table. It had been a long time since Hermione had seen Minerva in person, but it had been even longer since she had seen any other members of the Hogwarts staff. Minerva, at least, was required to attend the same Ministry functions she accompanied Ron to.

Recognition flitted across the other woman's face and with a smooth gesture the Headmistress placed her wand away, though where it had disappeared to Hermione had not been able to see. "Hermione Granger," Minerva said in her distinct Scottish brogue, "is that you?" The faintest smile appeared on the other woman's lips as she spoke, and her emerald eyes sparkled as they took in the sight of the younger woman who had once been her prized pupil. The smile faltered slightly before returning, though it was somewhat forced. "My apologies, it's Weasley now, isn't it? Old habits die hard."

The smile that Hermione hadn't even known she was wearing slipped from her face as she was barely able to keep her expression from going past neutral and displaying her distaste. However, there was no denying the truth. "It is," she said shortly, casting about for another topic as she approached the dais. "It's good to see you, Professor," she told the other woman quietly. The smile returned, unbidden, to her face as she voiced that particular thought despite the fact that the Headmistress's already sharp gaze had sharpened even more after her first utterance. Nothing shifted in her expression to give it away, nor did her gaze harden, but Hermione nonetheless had the distinct impression that the other woman was attempting to bore a hole through her skull with her eyes in hopes of divining all of her secrets.

"And the same to you, Hermione," Minerva said with a barely perceptible hesitation before the Gryffindor's name. "I must admit, I never imagined I'd see you in this Hall again."

Subtle, yet undeniably probing. Only the Professors closest to the Headmistress's chair were openly paying them any attention at that point, and the students had long since returned to their earlier conversations. Strange things happened in Hogwarts all the time, after all, and if Professor McGonagall didn't appear at all concerned then there was no reason why any of them should spend any time worrying about the situation either.

"I didn't think I would ever be in this Hall again," Hermione told her former mentor honestly, "but I must say that it feels good to be back here. Somehow, Hogwarts has never stopped feeling like a home." She found herself wanting to get wrapped in nostalgia but pushed forward. "I apologize again for interrupting your dinner, but I was hoping to speak with you privately, if possible. If you're busy I can wait however long I have to, or perhaps return at some other time," she began, even though she was hoping that the other woman would favor her, as she had always seemed to, and set aside some time for her.

"That won't be necessary," Minerva stated, hand raised to cut the younger woman off just as she was about to start babbling. "As it turns out, I have some free time right now. Will my office be sufficient?" she inquired with the same brisk efficiency that Hermione remembered fondly.

"That would be perfect," Hermione replied, breathing a small sigh of relief at the suggestion as Minerva made her way around the staff table. It seemed to take forever for the other woman to make it all the way around but the other Professors had barely returned to their meals by the time the Transfiguration Mistress was merely a foot away.

"Sha-," she began as she came down the small set of steps leading up to the staff table, but the words cut off abruptly as she stopped dead in her tracks with a small gasp. "Hermione," she breathed. Hermione's heart stopped dead for a beat or two before starting again with an incredibly fast beat. There was no missing where the Headmistress's gaze was focused and what the slightly crestfallen, and slightly angry, expression on the older woman's face meant. Still, Hermione managed to gather some sort of composure and stare the other woman dead in the eye.

"Professor," she said blandly. She wasn't about to have this discussion right there in the middle of the Great Hall.

Minerva blinked once and then started walking, coming down the remaining step as if she had never stopped in the first place, her eyes not leaving the Gryffindor's face until they were almost level. "Minerva," she corrected gently, hand reaching out towards the small of the younger woman's back to shepherd her forward and towards the doors to the Great Hall. Hermione was too busy trying to get her heartbeat under control again to respond.

In contrast to the now-noisy Great Hall the rest of the castle was eerily silent as the two women passed through the corridors towards the Headmistress's office. With the entire school at dinner, and Peeves and all the ghosts elsewhere in the castle, they might have been entirely alone, and neither woman opened their mouth to speak the entire journey until Minerva reached the gargoyles that guarded the entrance to her office.

"Ice mice," she told them, pausing for a moment to allow them to spring aside and then stepping forward onto the moving staircase. Hermione followed, allowing the grinding of the stairs to wash over her senses as she steeled herself for what would, no doubt, be a difficult meeting.

The hallway outside the Head's office hadn't changed one bit since she had last been in it but as Minerva stepped through the mahogany doors that led to her office Hermione couldn't help but note the changes. The desk was still the same as were the walls, lined with portraits of the previous Headmasters and Headmistresses who clamored as they greeted the two witches. The doors closed behind Hermione soundlessly and she was moving her attention from the walls to the rest of the room, which was fairly stark in comparison with the clutter that had been present while Dumbledore was Headmaster, when Minerva spun around and grabbed her by the jaw. The portraits instantly went dead silent as Hermione instinctively flinched away, though not violently enough to free her from Minerva's grasp.

"Hermione," Minerva said, her voice breaking on the last syllable. The younger woman had been trying to look anywhere other than at Minerva, but the emotion in the Professor's voice made her look up. Blushing under the obvious scrutiny, she reached up and gently tugged the woman's hand down. Minerva had probably not been very aware of it, but her fingertips had been centimeters away from a bruise and having her hand gone made Hermione breathe easier for a reason that had nothing to do with being free of her grasp.

"You can appreciate, I'm sure, why I wanted to discuss this privately," Hermione said, her mouth feeling incredibly dry.

"Ron?" the venerable Headmistress asked, though it sounded vaguely rhetorical, spinning away from Hermione in a sudden flurry of robes to place both hands squarely on the organized desk sitting in the middle of the room.

Hermione chose to interpret the question, vague as it had been, differently than had been intended. "Hog tied, stunned, and in a full body bind on our bed," she replied, the faintest smile crossing her lips. Years from now, she would find the way she had left Ron utterly hilarious, if none of the rest of the story was, of that she had little doubt. "His wand is locked in a box that was warded with the same spells he has kept my wand 'protected' by for years." She paused and then continued, her voice softening. "I didn't know where else to go," she admitted, voice breaking on the last several syllables.

Minerva's fingers tightened on the edge of her desk for the briefest of instants, but the older witch's grip was tight enough to turn her knuckles white. How dare he do that to one of her lions! Never mind, of course, that he was one of her lions himself. And, what was worse was that no one had noticed. Harry and Ginny hadn't, none of the Weasleys had. She hadn't noticed. From what little she had heard about the way the Weasleys had been living since their marriage she was fairly certain that she had seen them almost as frequently as anyone else had. And she hadn't noticed. The sense of despair and self-loathing was enough to set her blood to boiling, stoking her already hair-triggered Scottish temper, but even though she was absolutely furious the Transfiguration Mistress couldn't ignore the pain and uncertainty in the younger woman's voice. It took an extreme effort to force herself to turn around—Minerva was sure that her face reflected every ounce of her thunderous rage at the youngest male Weasley and it was hardly the sort of emotion that she liked to show anyone, let alone the woman in question—but she did, gently pulling Hermione into a firm, yet cautious embrace. The former Head Girl resisted for a moment, looking up at Minerva's grim expression with a somewhat frightened and startled expression but gave in moments later, collapsing with a stifled sob into the other woman's arms. On auto-pilot, Minerva automatically shushed and soothed her, arms tightening the smallest fraction around the slender figure of her former pupil, while her eyes blazed in fury and her face continued to display the anger that sent her thoughts into a frenzy.

Albus Dumbledore, confined now to the world of portraits, flitted from frame to frame until he was able to see his successor's face. None of the other occupants of those frames even protested his presence; it was well known that Albus and Minerva had been extremely close and still were, despite the fact that Albus had been dead for nearing eight years. The emerald-eyed witch was still his best friend and he considered it his duty to look out for her. Sadly, in this sort of case there was truly little anyone could do. However, Albus wasn't entirely powerless. Minerva had thought it hilarious to put a second portrait of him down in the kitchens, given how much time he had spent traipsing the halls at night in search for hit chocolate, but there were times when it was dead useful. With barely a thought he found himself down in the kitchens, flagging down a house-elf to place an order for the Headmistress. Minutes later, Albus was re-entering his frame as the distinct pop of house-elf apparation caused the two women, still entangled in their embrace (Hermione just as helpless as she had appeared when he had first left and Minerva just as angry, if not more so), to pull apart. The sight of a tea service on her desk piqued Minerva's curiosity for only a moment before she noticed the three steaming cups, two filled with tea and another filled with hot chocolate. Her gaze jerked away from the desk and up to his portrait with a grateful smile and then she was pushing Hermione into one of the squashy armchairs in front of her desk.

"Would you care for tea or hot chocolate, Hermione?" the older witch asked gently, perching on the desk, facing Hermione, next to the tea service and automatically adding a few lumps of sugar and some milk to her tea. Albus knew how much she disliked hot chocolate, so she knew without a doubt that the tea was hers, and the choice was for Hermione. The woman in question didn't answer but simply leaned forward and started adding her own sugar and milk to the second cup of tea. Some part of Minerva smirked in triumph at seeing Hermione ignore the hot chocolate; if she'd needed any more proof that Albus Dumbledore was a world-class nutter his hot chocolate fetish was yet another quirk to add to the list. She had often assumed that he just shared a few preferences in beverages with the younger generation, but it appeared, as it had been for years, that Dumbledore was simply in a league of his own.

"Hermione," Minerva said minutes later. Hermione had been avoiding looking directly at her since she had taken her tea, staring off into space across the office and busying her hands with the minor task of preparing and drinking the tea. Minerva was somewhat glad for the moment of silence when the woman in front of her didn't look as if she was going to break to pieces at any second. It was easier to reign in her anger when the reason she needed to find Ron Weasley and curse him within an inch of his life wasn't staring her so blatantly in the face. Hermione had always been spirited, but Ron Weasley had, by all appearances, managed to do the impossible and break her. That such a thing was possible, and that it had happened, struck Minerva's very core. "I am sure that you have been through quite an ordeal tonight." And the past several years as well, but it was perhaps better to stay on the safe side and underestimate. She continued on, pushing words past a lump in her throat as she leaned forward to place a hand on the woman's knee. "Thank you for trusting me enough to come here, Hermione. It means everything to me." That much, at least, was true. Minerva had fought long and hard with all of her students to be there for them, supporting and guiding them, throughout their Hogwarts years, but she had been closer to Hermione than most. Still, she had always hoped that she had appeared to them to be the sort of person to whom they could come if they needed help, and Hermione's presence there that night told her that, at least in one case, she had succeeded. "I hope you'll forgive me for prying," she began delicately, "but, Hermione, do you have anyone else you'd like to contact?" The witch minutely shook her head. At least she was responsive; Minerva hadn't been entirely sure she had been listening. "Then stay here, at Hogwarts," she offered gently.

"I couldn't impose on you like that, Headmistress," Hermione choked out in response. It was precisely what she had hoped for when she had arrived, but she hadn't wanted to ask for such a favor. Especially since she wasn't sure how long she would be imposing on the elder woman's hospitality, and how much trouble her presence would cause the older woman.

"Nonsense," Minerva said instantly, rejecting the very idea with firm words but a gentle tone. "You are more than welcome here, Hermione."

"Professor," Hermione began, but stopped at the other woman's slight frown. "Minerva," she started again rewarded for her change in wording by the slight relaxation of the Headmistress's features, "I appreciate your offer more than you can imagine. I have come to realize that I have less true friends than I had imagined, and it means so much to me that you are being so kind. Nonetheless, I have to warn you." Her gaze shifted to her lap, and then back up to meet the other woman's piercing emerald eyes. "Ron will wake up, and he will get free of my bindings, and he will retrieve his wand." There was no doubt at all in her tone. "And when that happens, he will come for me. He has kept me under house arrest, living like a muggle, for the past three years, and not one person in our lives has noticed anything was ever amiss. He is much more subtle and intelligent than I have ever truly given him credit for." Minerva had to bite back a smile at that sentiment. "He has Ministry resources at his disposal, and he will stop at nothing to get me back under his thumb and keep this matter quiet. My staying here will only serve to bring trouble to you and Hogwarts for sheltering me." She didn't think for one instant that the Gryffindor in front of her would back down, even with such a warning, but she couldn't help but fell that full disclosure was necessary.

Minerva barely blinked, regarding her over her square spectacles with a solemnity that the always stern professor somehow still managed to rarely display. "The Ministry has been at odds with Hogwarts before, Hermione," she said finally, "but never once have they been able to gain control within these walls. They are welcome to try again, of course, but for you," she paused, realizing an amendment was needed with some shock, "for any one of my students, I would gladly let them come at me, and at Hogwarts, with everything they've got a thousand times over." She nodded firmly, as if to affirm her own statement. "Hogwarts will always give help to those who need it," she continued on, quoting the man who still watched the proceedings with some concern, hardly any of which had to do with the still untouched hot chocolate on the desk. "And you, my dear, appear to be in need of it. To be able to give that to you is a pleasure."

Hermione searched the other woman's face for any shred of hesitation, but found only determination. She allowed herself to relax, even if she was only able to do so by the smallest amount.

"Thank you," she whispered sincerely. The Headmistress didn't respond verbally, but the rare smile was enough to put the younger woman even more at ease.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:<strong> So, I just wanted to take the opportunity to apologize for the massive delay in getting this out to you all. I am, at best, always infrequent with my updates. With this story, I find it more than ever incredibly difficult to write (possibly because I am not and have never been in any of these character's positions), but I know I love this idea too much to give up fully. So, it's slow going, at least for now (hopefully as I get farther in it will get easier, or the material will steer towards something more familiar), but until then, I'm sorry about how long this has taken. Hope you enjoyed!


	3. Chapter 3

A grim faced Ronald Weasley squared his shoulders before pushing the wrought iron gates of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry open later that week. It had been nearly a week since he had woken on his bed, in a full body bind and tied with ropes from head to toe, to find that his wife had left in the middle of the night. It had taken an incredible amount of perseverance to get himself out of the mess Hermione had left him in that night, and he was less than thrilled about the entire situation. Not only had he nearly embarrassed himself—he had no pretensions about what would have happened had someone from the Ministry flooed his house to see where he was when he didn't show up at work that day—but he was short a wife. A wife who, it seemed, had somehow gone from perfectly trained to too big for her britches. Now, if only Ron could find her, he would see about getting her ego back down to size.

The problem, of course, was that it had taken that entire week to even get this close to finding her. He had come into work late, brushing of the questions of those who had wanted to pry, and instantly gone to work on trying to find his errant wife. He did, after all, have Ministry resources at his very fingertips, and it seemed silly to not use them simply because the woman he was searching for was more escapee than missing person. Searching for women on the run was, in part, what he was paid to do anyway, wasn't it, and this woman was more important than any woman he'd ever tried to find. She was thorough, though, he had to give her that. He'd tracked down their phone records (while connected to the Floo network their house had no Floo Powder in it so that it couldn't be used as an escape and he'd been forced to have a phone installed as well so that Hermione had some means of communication), both their home phone and her personal mobile phone, but each came up free of any leads. He had checked their credit card records as well, but they had been as equally blank as their phone records. No one had flooed in or out of their house that night. Without a record of her wand signature on file there would be no was to track her apparations. His trip to Gringotts to try and track withdrawals and other details about their finances that couldn't be found in their credit card statement had been, unsurprisingly, fruitless. The goblins had seemed to be, if possible, even more unhelpful than usual.

With all of the factual evidence thus eliminated from the list of things that were useful he found that the only thing that was truly left on the list was eyewitness accounts. The problem with that being that Ron had made it a point to isolate the two of them as a couple from the rest of their friends and family, mostly so that Hermione would have any easy opportunities. He had made sure that the only way for friends and family to see her, though they wouldn't have realized it as such, was for her to come to them, in his company, during approved family functions. After spending too much time dodging questions that came uncomfortably close to prying, and spending too much time trying to get rid of the unnerving feeling that Ginny's too-curious, and at the same time too-knowledgeable, gaze had left him with he still had nothing. There was only one place left to look before he would have to admit that, somehow, he had made a grave miscalculation about his abilities to retrieve her should she try to make a break for it.

Being back at Hogwarts, though, and readying himself for a confrontation with Minerva McGonagall had brought the feeling he had gotten while talking with his sister back in full force. He forced his steps into the comfortably familiar gait of easy confidence that he had honed over his years as an Auror and tried not to let any of his inner turmoil affect his gait or his expression. If only he had known how dangerously fine the line was between his easy and confident steps and the arrogant strut that he had so scorned when displayed by Draco Malfoy. Being back at Hogwarts reminded him of how it had felt to be a kid going to school there. In the back of his mind, Minerva McGonagall was still his stern head of house and someone who was to be feared, awed, and respected. In the back of his mind he was still the gangly sidekick who barely scraped by with lots of help from his friends. In the back of his mind he knew that if he ever found Hermione and didn't manage to get the drop on her that she was every bit as scary with a wand as she had been back when he was eleven. Despite all of his Auror training, Hermione Weasley was a force to be reckoned with. The imagined simulation of how that fight would go wasn't made more attractive when coupled with his memories of their Hogwarts days. But there was nowhere else Hermione would have gone, and no one else she would have gone to. Either she had dropped off the face of the earth and never planned on seeing a familiar face again, or she was at Hogwarts.

He gave a weary glance up at the castle as he continued his trek across the grounds. The castle was huge, and without the Maurader's Map, or help from another source, finding Hermione, if she didn't want to be found, would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. With a sinking feeling in his gut, he shouldered the large oak doors open and stepped inside. What were his chances that Minerva would be willing to help him? Slim to none, he decided as he started towards the staircase, dodging students without thinking. For their part they gave him a wide berth; he had chosen to arrive dressed in his Auror robes just in case he needed any of the extra authority, and to them, inexperienced as they were, he looked like someone who was both important and in charge. With any more experience they would be able to see that he was quaking in his boots.

At that precise moment only a few floors above Ron's head the Headmistress's fireplace flared green and a sooty Hermione Weasley tumbled out of the flames. Minerva didn't look up, but a smile crossed her lips nonetheless as she took a guess at who the arrival could possibly be. It could hardly be attributed to any psychic ability—especially given that Minerva thought Divination was a load of crock anyway—but rather the sharpened senses of her Animagus form which allowed her to identify the woman by scent alone coupled with the fact that Hermione had left from that very fireplace only an hour ago, and had been expected back shortly. The two women had managed to become even closer than they had been back when Hermione was a student in the short span of a week, for reasons that mostly had to do with support and healing. Hermione hardly wanted to be left alone, and had taken to notifying the Headmistress where she was going and when, just in case something were to happen to her while she was out. Minerva, for her part, was equally reluctant to let the other woman be alone any more than necessary; Hermione took meals with the rest of the staff and students in the Great Hall and the two women took tea in Minerva's office, or sitting room, every night before going their separate ways for bed.

"How did your errand go?" the Scottish witch inquired, tone sounding rather vague due to the fact that she was still scribbling away on a piece of parchment and had yet to actually look up. The distinctive thwack of a stack of papers being tossed onto her desk did make her pause, though only for an instant, but she did look up when she finished her sentence to find the woman in question beaming at her.

"Those papers," Hermione began dramatically, "say that I am once again, officially, Hermione Granger."

Minerva's smile was nearly as large as Hermione's. "Congratulations, Hermione," she said earnestly. There was nothing to prevent Ron from kidnapping her, of course, but a divorce went a lot towards putting both women more at ease. At least he would have a more difficult time weaseling his way out of charges if Hermione turned up missing one day and was found to have been in the company of her now ex-husband. Hermione had taken to flooing, rather than apparating, to her various destinations, knowing that apparation points weren't always very close to the place one was trying to arrive at. This had been especially insisted upon for that day's journey to Gringotts to deal with some legal issues. The paperwork would have to be filed with the Ministry of course, and not many knew that it could be processed at Gringotts, but Hermione hadn't wanted to risk popping into the place where the very person she was most trying to avoid worked and leave it to chance that things would work out alright. Not wanting to risk having to walk through Diagon Alley either, she had simply flooed straight to the bank itself and gotten not only the divorce paperwork signed and filed, but also, Minerva would imagine, the contents of the couple's joint account separated once more. Ronald was in for a rude awakening someday, for more than one reason, Minerva thought with glee. Capping her ink bottle, she stood and came around the desk to embrace the younger woman. "And just how were you planning on celebrating such a momentous occasion?" she asked, eyes sparkling.

"Why, I hadn't yet decided, Professor McGonagall," Hermione replied, eyes sparking in return as she attempted mock seriousness. She cracked only a few seconds later. "I had thought perhaps some champagne in my quarters tonight?" she offered, this time in all seriousness.

"I'd be delighted," Minerva responded as one of the many Headmasters on the wall popped back into their portrait.

"Headmistress, the Weasley boy is in the castle and on his way up here," he announced sharply, interrupting the two women without hesitation. They had spent too much time in that office discussing Ron's actions for any of the portraits to have been able to miss what an important and sensitive situation this was.

Suddenly all business, Minerva nodded curtly and took half a step away from the chestnut-haired woman in front of her. "Thank you, Fortescue," she told the man in the frame as she reached behind her for the stack of divorce papers Hermione had not so long ago set down on her desk. Pressing the stack back into the woman's hands, and trying to momentarily ignore how stiff Hermione seemed to have gotten. "Hermione," she said gently, "you need to go. It wouldn't do for you to be found here." The Headmistress had hoped that the younger woman would relax some at the idea of being able to get out before Ron got there, but she didn't, and Fortescue was shaking his head.

"There's no time for her to get far enough away before he's here, Minerva," he explained hastily. The Animagus' mind raced before seizing on an idea with single-minded clarity.

"Hermione," she tried again, reaching out and grabbing the other woman by the shoulders. Somehow, this managed to focus the woman's gaze and attention on the raven-haired witch in front of her. "I need you to go upstairs and stay there, absolutely silent, while I get rid of him, okay?" she instructed. The Head's quarters were separate from the office, for a reason Minerva had yet to fathom, which meant there would be no escaping into any other room that Ron wouldn't dare search and only left the most harebrained option left: to hide Hermione just out of sight in a place so unprotected that Ron wouldn't think either of them would be so risky to try. Her office was on multiple levels, though only the bottom level was actually used as an office. The others were more balconies than anything, and held odd objects like telescopes that she hardly ever used, but that had windows that afforded a lovely view of the grounds as a whole. Hermione could hide up there and not be able to be seen from below, but there would be nothing to keep Ron from walking up there himself, as the area was hardly blocked off. In fact, the view on the second level was clearly visible from the first and practically invited people to investigate. If he did he would find himself directly underneath the woman he so desperately sought.

"Hermione, I promise you," Minerva said with a fierce desperation, "that you and I will sit down to a nice bottle of champagne, or something stronger if the case warrants it, once he is fully off the grounds." Her faith that Hermione would still be on Hogwarts grounds once Ron had left seemed to shake Hermione free of the paralyzing fear that had come over her. The curly-haired woman gave a sharp nod, took one last desperate glance at the door, and then hurried up the stairs.

Minerva took a deep breath, counted slowly to three, and then crossed the room to seat herself behind her desk once more. The ink bottle was uncapped again by the time the ring of Hermione's shoes on the metal steps stopped, and when the proximity wards she had set on the gargoyle below went off she was already starting the next sentence on the document in front of her. Luckily it was simply a piece of notes for her own records, and nothing that had to be shown to anyone, because she was fairly sure she was so distracted, having to split her attention so many different ways, that none of the words she was writing actually made any sense when strung together.

Ron knocked sharply on the door.

"Enter," she called, not looking up until he had taken several steps into the office and forcing some shock to wash over her features.

"Hello, Professor McGonagall," he said simply. Minerva refrained from gaping at him, but only barely.

"Mr. Weasley," she said eventually, "I must admit it has been quite some time since I last saw you. Your mother and father are doing alright?" she asked, not with false concern. Molly and Arthur had been good friends, and it was always worth it to her to ask after them.

"Quite, Professor," he responded, shifting on his feet like he always had when he'd served detention with her, or been called on in class. Some small part of her smirked at seeing him uncertain now that he was on her turf. And it was only better because he had every right to feel uncertain.

"And your brothers?"

"All doing fine, Headmistress."

"Your sister? Mr. Potter?"

"Both excellent. I talked to them earlier this week."

"Your wife?"

There was a pause in which you could have heard a pin drop before Ron answered.

"Hermione is actually the reason why I'm here." Minerva only arched an eyebrow, not speaking for fear he wouldn't go on. "I know how this is going to sound, Professor, but have you seen or spoken to Hermione recently?"

Her other eyebrow arched to join the first. "You're not mistaken, Mr. Weasley, that does sound rather ominous," she replied, artfully dodging the question. She didn't want to outright lie to the man, not if it could be helped. "Is everything alright?"

Ron reached up to rub at the back of his neck, which was turning slightly pink. "Not precisely," he hedged. Minerva couldn't tell what he was embarrassed about: telling his former professor all about his marital issues, that he had let Hermione escape, or that he was dangerously close to saying something a touch more revealing than he would have liked. He sighed when she didn't jump in and save him from having to elaborate. What he didn't know, of course, was that rather than wanting to spare him embarrassment, she wanted to see every single excruciating moment of him trying to gloss over the details of their home life. "Look, Professor, Hermione and I got into some sort of disagreement the other night, and when I woke up she'd taken off. I figured, hey, maybe she just needs some space and time to cool off, you know, and so I didn't try and track her down right away. I mean, if she needed her space, the last thing that would help would be me tracking her down before she was ready. I assumed that she'd gone to stay with Ginny and Harry, or maybe her parents, or maybe some other friend of ours that would be less obvious, and that she'd come back. But when she didn't I started to get worried, so I started making some calls. Ginny and Harry haven't seen her, nor have her parents, or mine, nor any of my brothers, or any of our other classmates. I even tried to use some Ministry resources to track her down," Minerva barely held back a snort at that admission, "but even that didn't turn up anything. Hogwarts was the last place to look.

"Professor, I love my wife very much, and I miss her terribly. If you've seen her—," he trailed off there, and Minerva finally took pity on him. He had tried very hard, and succeeded, at making the story seem as if the entire thing was a huge misunderstanding. She had seen the bruises, though fading, that had graced Hermione's delicate features, though, and with Hermione's statement that such a thing had been going on for roughly three years she was less than inclined to take Ron Weasley at his word.

"My sincerest apologies, Mr. Weasley, that such a trivial thing like a misunderstanding could have caused so much pain and torment," she said easily. Had it truly been a misunderstanding, and physical abuse had not been involved, it truly would have been a tragedy that something so small could have done such damage. However, "It may be, perhaps, that Hermione is not ready to return, and that is why she has been so difficult to locate," she suggested. Again, had his story been truthful, this would have been perfect advice. "You never know, she may turn up when you least expect it." Minerva thought it likely that, if Hermione were to suddenly return to that house, it would be to give Ron Weasley a hexing he'd never forget, but that was neither here nor there. "However, I must unfortunately inform you that I have not, in fact, seen your wife." It was splitting hairs, but this way she felt less guilty for lying to the man. Hermione was, in all aspects, and as Ron would soon find out, no longer his wife.

Ron's shoulders slumped. He had really hoped that Minerva would, at the very least, give him some sort of hint as to Hermione's whereabouts. With his Ministry resources he knew that he should have been able to track her down unless someone else was helping her; after all, buying things required either gold or sterling, and she'd had neither when she left their house. He'd kept an eye on Diagon Alley, so she hadn't gone there, and if she'd left the country magically he'd have been able to find record of it. The only way for her to have left would be through muggle means, but that, too, required money. Someone was sheltering her, and if he'd been a betting man he'd have said it was McGonagall, but now he wasn't quite as sure.

"Well, thanks anyway, Professor," he said, turning to leave. There was nothing else he could do that very day, even if Hermione was in the castle, but cut his losses and return again some other day, when he had (hopefully) managed to gather some more proof.

"I'm sorry that I could not be of more help to you, Ronald," she said kindly. In some ways, she was sorry. Sorry that he had turned out the way that he had, sorry that he had made the life of one of her students miserable, and sorry that she had not seen such a thing coming and worked harder to prevent it. Ron paused, one hand on the doorknob.

"If you do see her, would you tell her I'm looking for her?" She nodded, and he gave a small smile. The Hermione he'd known before she'd left had been scared stiff at the thought of risking his displeasure, and though she'd managed to overcome that enough too escape from him he doubted that years of habit could have been broken in one instant. If she was at Hogwarts, and Minerva did tell her that he was looking for her, he sure as hell hoped it put the fear of God into her. Sooner or later, everyone makes a mistake, and panicked people were twice as likely to mess things up; when she did the same, he'd have her.

Minerva watched the door close behind the young redhead before she let herself relax even a fraction. Even so, her senses were still wired as she stood from her chair and walked around to the front side of her desk again. "Fortescue, would you-?" she began, only slightly surprised when the man left his frame before her sentence was finished. He would see to it that Ron was safely out of the castle, and report it if he lingered or turned back. Minerva wasn't entirely sure that she could handle another meeting with him, but hopefully there would be more time to spare if it came to that. Adrenaline drained from her body, leaving her feeling suddenly exhausted, and Minerva slumped bonelessly into one of the chairs in front of her desk.

The slight ring of boots on the stairs made her look up just in time to see Hermione's feet come into view, the hem of her sapphire blue robes trailing behind her elegantly. If one didn't look at the expression on her face, or too closely at her tense musculature, Minerva would have said she was absolutely stunning. As it was, Hermione's face displayed sheer terror, with only the faintest intermingling of relief, and Minerva was so distracted by the terrible combination that Minerva was barely aware of thinking that her prized pupil was stunningly gorgeous. Instead, she leapt to her feet again and moved across the office to meet Hermione at the foot of the stairs. The two were close enough, after the events of that week, that Hermione only paused an instant before launching herself into Minerva's arms, nestling comfortably into the woman's embrace, her head fitting perfectly in the hollow of the Headmistress's neck. Minerva, for her part, didn't hesitate to wrap her arms around the young woman. Hermione had not felt the need to bawl her eyes out on someone's shoulder since that very first night, so it was hardly as if the pair had much experience with the current situation, but Minerva hardly felt the awkwardness of it. She had never prized herself on being the most comforting of the Professors at Hogwarts, but with Hermione it just seemed to come incredibly naturally to her, like she'd been doing it her entire life and like she could continue to do so, with no undue stress, for an indefinite period of time.

When Hermione's sniffles had ceased, and Minerva had wandlessly summoned a box of tissue, the elder witch settled her thoughts on where to take the day from there. It wasn't terribly late, per say, but it felt as if the day had dragged out to an incredible length. The encounter with Ronald had left her inexplicably drained, and she had no doubt that Hermione was equally fatigued and ready to attempt to de-stress. A look at the clock on her mantle assured her that dinner would be starting shortly, but she doubted either of them felt up to the rowdiness of the Great Hall. Another glance, this time at the portraits lining the wall, showed her that Fortescue was back in his frame. Ron had left the castle, then, and it was safe to move about. Briskly, Minerva crossed back over to her desk and started penning a short note, her mind made up.

"Have dinner with me?" she requested as she initialed the parchment, waiting to send it on it's way until she had the answer to that question. "I doubt either of us are in the mood for the Great Hall, and I promised you that we would crack open your bottle of champagne. I think I'd like to crack open a bottle of Scotch, while we're at it," she added wryly. Hermione nodded, and Minerva tapped the finished note with her wand. It disappeared in a small flash, causing the smallest frown of confusion to cross the younger woman's face. "To Filius, letting him know not to expect my presence in the Great Hall, and that I will be unavailable until tomorrow morning. I, for one, plan on getting a touch tipsy and trying to relax tonight." Rather than say anything, Hermione just nodded again. As she spoke, Minerva had been putting the last of her things away for the night, replacing the cap on her inkwell, and stepping out from behind her desk for the last time that night. "Shall we?" she asked, gesturing towards the door with one hand while she held out her other arm for Hermione to grab onto in a somewhat exaggerated gesture. She had meant for it to be somewhat humorous, but was surprised when her ex-pupil solemnly took the proffered arm and held on tightly, as if worried to let go. Unsure of what, precisely, that meant, Minerva didn't comment and let Hermione's hand stay on her arm for the duration of the walk to the elder witch's quarters.

"Make yourself at home," Minerva said, unnecessarily by this point given how much time Hermione had recently spent in the Headmistress's quarters. They had often had late night chats while Hermione had been a student, but never had Minerva invited the younger woman back to her quarters for such a talk, instead keeping their interactions to her classroom and office. That had all changed this week, and now Hermione was nearly as comfortable there as she was in her own quarters.

The elder witch watched as the brunette sat placidly on the sofa, hands clasped neatly and placed in her lap, and wondered what was going through her mind. Minerva knew Hermione well enough to know that while her demeanor appeared calm and unruffled that the other witch was anything but those things. Still, Hermione didn't appear to be inclined to say anything, and so Minerva ordered up some tea for the both of them and busied herself with removing her hat, which she sent to perch on the back of a chair with a practiced toss, and her boots. She was stirring sugar into her cup when Hermione finally spoke.

"He'll be back for me," she said suddenly, as if no time had passed since they were last discussing Ron's visit.

"Perhaps," Minerva acknowledged as she poured a small amount of whiskey into her tea. "But he has no solid proof that you are here, only his own theories and the arrogance to believe that you cannot be anywhere else."

"Is it still arrogance when it is also the truth?" Hermione said, voice rising slightly as her earlier emotions surfaced. She was holding sheer panic at bay now only by force of will.

"Maybe not," Minerva assessed slowly, surveying her former pupil over the rim of her square spectacles. "But I highly doubt that his resources are so extensive that there isn't one place on the map, besides Hogwarts, that he cannot touch."

Panic gave way to anger in the blink of an eye. "There is none," Hermione stated, voice flat, "or are you insinuating that after three years of this I was unable to take full stock of just exactly what he is and is not capable of?"

"I am suggesting," Minerva said, firmly asserting herself before the younger witch could truly get worked up, "that perhaps appearances are deceiving and that your position, though close to the inner workings of his setup, did not have a clear view of them. If I had to guess, I'd say that Ronald has very strategically placed his resources so that were you to escape he would be most able to catch you before you made it out of his purview. Hogwarts, while geographically within it, is the exception. Perhaps he has guessed, given the impression of his power that he wishes for you to have, that you would feel it the only safe place available to you."

"So what you're saying is that I've brought danger unnecessarily to your doorstep." Hermione sounded disgusted, though with Minerva or herself the Headmistress had no real idea. "Perhaps I'll just go, then." To the Transfiguration Mistress's dismay, the brunette actually stood as she spoke.

"Don't." The word had left Minerva's mouth before she was even aware of it. There were many reasons why it was a bad idea for the other woman to go. Ron had tightened his nets now, and though Hogwarts was free of Ministry influence enough to be a safe zone, the area that Hermione would have to pass through to get to the next safe zone was not. Furthermore, Minerva had made a promise to the younger woman to assist her, and she'd known that it would mean having Ministry Aurors, though if she was lucky it would only be Ronald, invading Hogwarts somewhere along the line. There was, after all, only so much that she could do to impede an investigation like that, and she doubted that they even needed a full search of the castle to be able to find what they needed. Neither she nor Hermione had bothered to hide her presence from the students or other professors, and all it would take would be an innocent sounding question before Ron knew for sure where Hermione was. As of that moment, he only had his suspicions.

The last reason, however, was the one that gave her the most pause. It was the reason that made the idea of Hermione leaving Hogwarts border on physically painful. Minerva had been thoroughly enjoying the younger woman's presence, though she didn't care to investigate as to the reason behind that sentiment, and the idea of losing her sounded like the worst thing in the world.

"Why not?" Hermione's crisp tone, each word bitten off so that it nearly made a sentence of it's own, kept Minerva from exploring her thoughts too much.

_Because I want you to stay here with me,_ Minerva found herself suddenly aching to say. Instead, she settled for a more practical response. "You warned me that I would be tangling with the Ministry when you first came to me a week ago, Hermione, and I agreed then. Whether or not you _did_ have other options at the time is irrelevant; something, maybe fate, sent you here, to me, and I swore to you that I would help you and keep you safe, regardless of what it took to make that happen." Minerva had yet to actually take a seat, but she had been moving, bit by bit, towards the sofa since the tea had arrived. Now, however, she finally made a bold move and took the three swift strides required to place her right next to it and the younger woman, who, though standing, had yet to actually head for the door. "Please, sit," she entreated the other woman, reaching out to grab one slender wrist and tugging slightly as she, herself, sat.

Hermione wordlessly followed suit, and though it seemed as if tension was still high in the room, Minerva couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. At least for a few more moments, Hermione was staying.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: <strong>Well, this was up way sooner than I was expecting, which makes me as excited as I hope it makes you guys! Anyway, looks like things are slowly (very slowly) heating up between our two witches, and Ron is starting to put together enough of the puzzle to become really dangerous. Fair warning to all involved, this will become a femmeslash fic at some point. If you're not okay with that, then don't read. Furthermore, this will be a slow-building romance between the two, so don't expect sparks to fly and clothes to start flying off of them any time soon. Though undoubtedly passionate, Hermione doesn't strike me as being in the mood to be looking for romance in her life (what, with all that's happened) and Minerva doesn't seem the type to fall in love and make a move on a former student (particularly one who has gone through what Hermione has) lightly. Expect there to be a lot of hesitation here, but I promise the clothes will eventually come flying off ;)


	4. Chapter 4

Agreeing to stay, however much the agreement had been pure implication, didn't mean that Hermione's brain had agreed to stop thinking. Despite the champagne, and the scotch, that was consumed that night, despite the long conversation and good company, Hermione's brain couldn't stop thinking. And even though she stayed, in the morning her thoughts went full force once more.

Sometimes, being in the castle did more harm than good. At least outside the walls she could be free of memories, while within the halls it always seemed like there was some flash of 6 happy years waiting for her. If she was lucky, it was a simple case of nostalgia that hit her about the strangest things, but when her thoughts were this jumbled it was more likely to be something about Ron, about how young they had been and about how horribly things had ended up. And there was no denying that things had gone horribly, not when she was hiding out in Hogwarts, with only one friend to her name and even fewer galleons, and when Ron was still out there looking for her. And he was getting dangerously close.

She knew that he would be back for her soon. There was no way that he would give up unless he was forced to, and Hermione couldn't think of a single thing that could force her now-ex-husband to stop coming after her. It was yet another issue that her mind would need to spend time tumbling over and over, hoping to find the solution to a problem that was several years old. Despite her own initial defiance, in having left him as she finally had, and how much she had come to enjoy the freedom that she never wanted to give up again, she was losing ground rapidly to doubts that she would ever be able to get her life back. How long would it take before even Minerva's substantial protection was not enough? The witch was formidable, and well respected after having taught the majority of wizarding society in Britain, but that could only take them so far. There could be public outcry if there was an Auror raid on Hogwarts, and likely would be if it was disruptive enough to the students, and no small amount of protest on Minerva's behalf, but that didn't necessarily equal and legitimate traction against the Ministry. When it came right down to it, people still were afraid of anything not under Ministry control; the war hadn't been too long ago and the idea that there had been an entire movement at work that had entirely escaped notice had, for the most part, resulted in a societal wish to see more brought under the Ministry's control, rather than a wish to see the Ministry simply be more observant and less corrupt. Logic, Hermione knew, often didn't play any part in determining how a group of people thought, and there could be no predicting where the others would fall if there was an actual struggle.

"Good morning, Hermione," came Minerva's familiar brogue from beside her. Hermione hadn't realized that she was so lost in thought that the other witch would be able to sneak up on her, which was yet another thing to concern herself with. It wouldn't do to rely too heavily on Minerva's protection, even while within Hogwarts. Experience, and 6 years of it, had taught her that bad things could still come to those who walked the halls of the school, and that mere teachers couldn't always protect them. As worried as she was though, she couldn't help but smile up at the Headmistress, who had proven almost every second of this entire ordeal that she was truly a rare person.

"Good morning, Minerva," the young woman replied. "Have a good night?" She distinctly had memories of a more than tipsy Minerva McGonagall from the night before, and was in part surprised to see the other woman looking so... normal. Passing it off as the work of those highly regarded Scottish genes, Hermione put that puzzle out of her mind.

"I did. I find it nice to forget about things for a while and just concentrate on the moment," the other witch replied, looking at her through square-rimmed glasses with an emotion in her eyes that Hermione couldn't read. "And you?"

"It was alright," she replied, and a slight frown crossed Minerva's features. "What's wrong?"

"I find myself wishing that you could find more peace than you obviously have, is all," Minerva admitted softly, and Hermione glances at her curiously. "Though I do know that it's beyond hopeless, not to mention stupid, to wish that your brilliant mind to stop trying to solve at least a dozen problems all before breakfast." Green eyes sparkle playfully, any hint of sadness or discontent all but vanished, and Hermione couldn't help but feel her spirits lift. Professor McGonagall, even in the years where Hermione had been close to her as a student, was never quite so playful as she had been for the past few weeks, and Hermione was decidedly a fan of the transformation.

"This time here at Hogwarts has been a much wished for and much needed respite, Minerva, and I do need you to understand that I say those words with the utmost amount of sincerity and gratitude," she said, wishing that her former mentor understood how blessed she had been feeling, despite the turmoil.

"I do understand, Hermione, but I also understand that respites are, by their very nature, temporary. I do wish that you'd begin to think of this as a more permanent situation." Hermione turned her head, mouth slightly agape, only to meet the Professor's pointed expression, single eyebrow raised archly. Blushing slightly, Hermione turned her gaze once more to the halls in front of her.

"I wish I knew a way to make it anything like that," Hermione admitted quietly.

Minerva's arm shot out, hand gently grasping Hermione's arm just above the elbow, and drew the other woman to a halt, right in the middle of the corridor. "We will find a way, Hermione. Try not to doubt that. There is always a way for those who need one." Hermione looked at her, wanting to believe it. "Now, I won't deny that we definitely are in need of one," Minerva continued, tugging the younger woman back to a walk, "but I think that between the two of us we might be able to come up with something."

Hermione smiled, charmed into believing it in spite of herself, and managed to keep the faith until several hours past lunch, up until the point where she walked into Minerva's office to find Harry Potter staring at her calmly.

"Harry!" she exclaimed, visibly startling.

"Hello Hermione," Harry said, putting the teacup in his hand back on the saucer. Hermione ignored him, almost instantly turning to Minerva with accusation in her eyes, "I thought you were helping me!"

"I am," Minerva replied calmly over the cup of her tea. "I think Mr. Potter has a few interesting points to make and I think you should hear him out."

Hermione's gaze met Minerva's but when a moment passed and nothing had changed, each woman as stubborn as the other, Hermione broke their staring match, taking in the full tableau as she worked to come up with an answer to her flight or fight response. Ultimately, it was the sight of Harry's wand, familiar to her after so much time spent around the wizard, lying on the table out of easy reach, that decided it for her.

"You're welcome to hang onto that, if you'd like," Harry offered, nodding his head towards his wand the instant his keen eyes noticed how Hermione had zeroed in on it. Brown eyes snapped up to look at him, though it was obvious that Hermione was still uneasy. "It won't bother me in the slightest, Hermione, if that's what you need to do." Uncertainly, the witch looked at the older woman, still sipping her tea as if entirely unbothered by the whole event, for reassurance.

"Mine as well, should you like it," Minerva casually offered. And with all that had happened between them Hermione very much hated to admit that the idea was extremely tempting.

"Accio wands," Hermione said, drawing her own as quickly as she could but not managing to utter the words in anything more substantial than a miserable croak. Both pieces of wood came soaring towards her, and were easily caught.

"Who won the FIFA World Cup this year?" Hermione continued, looking to Harry for an answer. It had been a while since there had been a real threat of an Imperiused or Polyjuiced person waiting to take you unawares, but considering what Hermione had been through she knew that there was still a possibility that Ron was trying to get back at her. Ron had never had an excellent grasp on muggle sports, and had steadfastedly refused to follow anything that wasn't quidditch. Hermione had always maintained that it would be good for him to know these things, for when they went out around their muggle town of residence and for when Ron was forced to blend in for work, but none of the other sports had stuck.

"Italy."

Hermione blinked at the correct answer, not sure what she had been planning on doing once she had verified that the man in front of her really was her best friend. Out of better ideas, she strode across the room, three wands still in her hand, and poured herself a cup of tea, sensing that she was going to need something to focus on for the conversation ahead. When the task became too difficult to do one-handed, she placed the stack of wands down on the table. She was reasonably certain that Harry was actually Harry and, therefore, that Minerva was not under the influence of any charms or spells, but she much preferred that none of them have a wand to returning a potential weapon to someone she was still slightly unsure about.

"I sure hope this is going to come with an awesome explanation," she said, sitting back in her chair, tea in hand, looking directly at the messy-haired man across from her. She much preferred to address him rather than try and determine how to treat Minerva, who didn't seem at all bothered by anything that had happened over the past few minutes. The last time Hermione had seen someone so entirely unconcerned about something like this had been when Dumbledore was still alive, and it was the man himself who had behaved that way. Perhaps spending so much time around his portrait had rubbed off on the current Headmistress of Hogwarts.

"Unfortunately, it doesn't come with the kind that I want it to," he answered remorsefully. "Ginny sends her regards, but she thought it best if she stayed home."

"Why, so that she won't have to feel the urge to return me to her brother?" Harry winced at Hermione's obviously scathing tone.

"Hermione," Minerva interjected gently, tea still in hand, but Hermione wasn't having it.

"No, Minerva, it's been six years with that man and not a single person in my life had the courage to see what was under their noses. And while I appreciate your presence here, Harry, I do, I'm not seeing any real need to be kind about it."

"And that's fair. If you must know, Ginny is trying to meet with the rest of the Weasleys and sound things out. Ron did a fairly good job of spinning the story, and making things seem natural, and we all wanted not to see it, and that's not an excuse, but there's a lot to sort out now that there's no ignoring it. The two of us, we want to help you."

"And nothing will stop him from coming for me," Hermione informed him frankly. "He's already torn the country apart looking for me and he's even been here once. He will be back, and it won't be good when he catches up to me." Even from a position of freedom it was clear to see that she was terrified by the whole prospect.

"We want to help," Harry said, a touch desperately.

"Are you willing to get your best mate thrown in Azkaban for what he's done to me, Harry? Because that's what it's going to take."

"If I have to," he said resolutely, although it was clear to see that he didn't appreciate having to make a decision. Leaning forward so his elbows were resting on his knees, he carded a hand through already mussed hair. "I remember when I thought that nothing would ever be as hard as that war was."

"I will never be free of him any other way, Harry," Hermione said, smiling sadly. "I wish it didn't have to come to this, but there is no other option and I don't have the means to accomplish it myself."

"I know." The words were a huge win for Hermione, but the miserable look on Harry's face made it clear that, as always, victory came with a price. She only wished that this sense of innocence, from a generation that was already lacking much of it, was all they would have to pay before the whole thing was over.

Harry took his leave of the pair shortly after, not having had much to report on or really to discuss, but having wanted to make the trip out personally as part of his apology and his pledge to help Hermione. That had been a few minutes ago, and there was absolute silence within the Head's office that hadn't been broken by anything more substantial than the clinking of china cups against saucers.

"You're awfully quiet, Hermione," Minerva ventured when the tea in her cup was gone, placing both cup and saucer down on the table and looking earnestly at Hermione.

"Did you bring him here?" Hermione asked, voice hollow.

"I did not. He came to me himself and I merely let him stay until you arrived."

"What if it had been Ron?" Hermione cried teacup rattling down to the tabletop as she placed it down too quickly, heedless of spilling tea or chipping china, turning to face the older woman.

"It wasn't, Hermione, it wasn't Ron," the Headmistress soothed, abandoning her chair and perching herself beside Hermione in the small love seat. Unsure of exactly do, she followed her instincts and placed a single hand on the younger woman's knee, feeling warmth seep through the layers of robes as if it was hot enough to burn.

"But it could have been," Hermione hissed, standing abruptly, causing Minerva's hand to fall away. The Headmistress had spent enough time with hormonal and emotional teenagers to recognize that Hermione's reactions were beyond out of control if only because the woman herself didn't know whether she was coming or going, but that didn't help the fact that her instinct was telling her to bristle up like an annoyed cat. Sometimes, the animagus was less than helpful..

"But it wasn't, Hermione, and that's what matters." Minerva said forcefully, standing as well and not caring that doing so left barely any space between the two of them. "Because what matters is that I care enough for you to know better than to fall into a trap as easily as you seem to suggest I am capable. I've lived through three wars, or have you forgotten?"

"Of course I haven't forgotten, Minerva, but forgive me for being cautious when it is in regards to my own welfare and likely my life."

"I understand your fear, Hermione, but you need to trust that I want to help you." The Headmistress took a step in towards her former pupil, pressing them even closer together but needing to stress the issue to Hermione and simply reacting on feel to the situation. "I am looking out for you, Hermione, and I am being as careful as I possibly can to not do exactly what you've accused me of. I apologize if you feel that I am being cavalier with your life and with your safety but I assure you that I am taking every precaution on your behalf." The words were firm but not as angry as Minerva knew they could have been with any other person. She was hot-headed at best, though she had spent many years trying to gain more control over her emotions than her emotions had on her, but something about the younger woman in front of her made her soften without thinking, as if she was subconsciously trying to get rid of her sharp edges when she was around the curly-haired brunette.

Hermione looked up at her, guilt shining in her eyes. "I know. I'm sorry."

"I know that this is difficult, Hermione, and I do understand that," Minerva continued, voice even softer now, noticing that Hermione had not stepped away from her even though the two women were well within each other's space bubble. Wondering if she should pull back or if doing so would draw more attention to the fact that they had been so close at all, she added, "But I do care for you and I am trying to help. Please trust me to do so."

"Oh Minerva," Hermione said, expelling the words in a breathy exhale that only made Minerva more aware of the lack of distance between them, but suddenly unable to bring herself to move away. Soft hands reached for Minerva's own and held them, squeezing gently. "I do trust you. I'm sorry I let my stress get the best of me; I've always been particularly terrible at that," she said with a rueful chuckle. "Thank you for always taking such good care of me," the younger woman added, leaning up to press a soft kiss to the professor's cheek. Minerva barely held in her gasp of surprise, and was still mentally reeling as Hermione's hands slipped from hers with a final squeeze and the younger woman reached to pick up her wand from the table, stepping away and finally breaking the spell. Minerva blinked, still unable to make sense of exactly what had just happened, and when she looked up, alarmed to find that she was blushing slightly, her former student was across the room.

"Will I see you at dinner?" Hermione asked with a genuine smile that brightened her whole face.

"Yes," Minerva responded, alarmed to find her voice slightly hoarse. She tried again. "Yes, I just have some correspondence to finish up here and then I shall be heading down."

"Great, see you at dinner then," Hermione said easily and strode from the room, leaving Minerva to stare dumbly after her.

"What. Was. That?"


End file.
